Director, Technical Program Management - EMEA

ABOUT THE ROLE

Rafay is seeking a hands-on Director of Technical Program Management to lead strategic customer deployments and drive execution across Rafay’s Kubernetes and GPU PaaS platform initiatives. This is a highly visible leadership role responsible for overseeing complex enterprise implementations while remaining deeply engaged in technical delivery, customer architecture discussions, and cross-functional execution.

The ideal candidate combines strong program leadership with deep technical expertise in Kubernetes, cloud infrastructure, GPU/AI workloads, and enterprise platform delivery. This leader will serve as a trusted advisor to customers and internal stakeholders, helping drive successful onboarding, modernization, migration, and adoption initiatives across large-scale enterprise environments.

Unlike a traditional people-management-only director role, this position requires hands-on involvement in technical project execution, customer solutioning, escalation management, and operational leadership.

TOP 3 REQUIRED SKILLS / EXPERIENCE

• Proven leadership managing complex enterprise technical programs and customer-facing implementations in cloud, Kubernetes, AI/ML, or infrastructure environments. 
• Deep technical expertise in Kubernetes, GPU workloads, cloud platforms, containers, and modern infrastructure architectures. 
• Strong executive communication and stakeholder management skills with the ability to influence customer leadership, engineering teams, and cross-functional partners. 

RESPONSIBILITIES

• Lead and oversee strategic customer implementations for Rafay’s Kubernetes and GPU PaaS platform offerings across EMEA. 
• Serve as the primary technical program leader for large-scale onboarding, migration, modernization, and platform adoption initiatives. 
• Drive program execution across multiple concurrent enterprise engagements while maintaining hands-on involvement in technical planning and delivery. 
• Partner directly with customer engineering, platform, infrastructure, DevOps, and executive stakeholders to define scope, align priorities, and ensure successful outcomes. 
• Lead customer discovery workshops, architecture reviews, technical planning sessions, and implementation governance. 
• Collaborate closely with Product, Engineering, Customer Success, Pre-Sales, and Partner teams to align delivery priorities and remove execution blockers. 
• Provide technical leadership and guidance around Kubernetes, GPU infrastructure, cloud-native architectures, AI/ML platform deployments, hybrid cloud, and multi-cloud implementations. 
• Establish scalable delivery processes, implementation methodologies, operational best practices, and program governance frameworks. 
• Own program risk management, escalation handling, dependency tracking, and executive-level communication throughout the delivery lifecycle. 
• Drive accountability across internal and external teams to ensure projects are delivered on time, within scope, and aligned with customer expectations. 
• Act as a senior escalation point for complex customer issues, deployment challenges, and critical implementation risks. 
• Mentor and guide TPMs, solutions architects, and technical delivery resources while helping scale Rafay’s customer delivery organization. 
• Maintain hands-on familiarity with supporting technologies and frameworks including Observability, DevSecOps, CI/CD, GitOps, FinOps, GPU orchestration, and cloud infrastructure tooling. 
• Contribute to strategic initiatives that improve customer onboarding, operational efficiency, deployment automation, and overall customer experience. 

QUALIFICATIONS

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, Information Technology, or related field. 
• 10+ years of experience in technical program management, technical project management, cloud infrastructure, or enterprise software delivery. 
• 5+ years leading complex enterprise customer deployments involving Kubernetes, cloud-native technologies, infrastructure modernization, or AI/ML platforms. 
• Strong hands-on technical expertise with Kubernetes, containers, cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, GCP), networking, infrastructure, and distributed systems. 
• Experience leading cross-functional technical teams in fast-paced startup or high-growth technology environments. 
• Strong understanding of enterprise architecture, cloud operations, infrastructure scalability, and modernization initiatives. 
• Proven ability to communicate effectively with executives, architects, engineers, and customer stakeholders. 
• Experience managing multiple concurrent programs with complex dependencies and executive visibility. 
• Preferred certifications include PMP, AWS Solutions Architect, CKA/CKAD, or equivalent cloud/Kubernetes certifications.